54 The Mahdbharata : A Criticism.
of her advice, but she firmly replies : " I have had enjoy-
ment enough during my husband's time. I incited you
to fight because I did not wish you to beg." Her last
parting advice to her sons may be written in golden
letters : " Believe in righteousness. Have minds ever
great/1 It is the purport of the whole Mahabharata
condensed into one single line.
The female characters of the Mahabharata, elevated
as they are, have a touch 6f humanity which makes the
whole world kin. When Arjuna brings his second wife
Subhadra to Indraprastha, Draupadi expresses her feeling
of jealousy in a happy metaphor: "The first tie how-
ever firm and strong relaxes when followed by another."
Kunti when Kama appears in the lists of the tourna-
ment faints. Uttara asking Arjuna to accompany her
brother on his expedition against the Kauravas requests
him to bring good pieces of cloth for the use of her dolls,
never doubting that her brother would conquer their
mighty hosts. These and other touches of the poet,
illustrative of feminine weakness, make the female cha-
racters of the Mahabharata all the more lovable.
Thirdly, the divine characters in the Mahabharata are,
unlike those in the Illiad, really divine and not comic.
It has generally been remarked that if there are any
comic scenes in the Illiad, for there is little room for
comic scenes in the grave march of an epic poem, they
are those on the top of the Olympus, The gods in heaven
squabble over affairs on the earth; they assist mortals in
the most whimsical manner for very low motives.
Even Jove, the Almighty God, is often distracted by the
importunities of his wife Juno, who has peculiar par-